


A Drink And A Half

by Churbooseanon, ReforgedMind (Churbooseanon)



Category: X-Men (Comicverse), Young Avengers (Comics)
Genre: Developing Relationship, M/M, Romantic Tension, filling in the gaps of canon, it's a five and one style thing but slightly different, more tags as they come up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:21:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26104888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Churbooseanon/pseuds/Churbooseanon, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Churbooseanon/pseuds/ReforgedMind
Summary: The tension starts on a hill in New York, looking down at a New Year's party. It gets to a point where they have to find excuses to cover the heat building between them. A slow escalation of cover until there's nothing left but them and a kiss.Five times Tommy and David had excuses for a shared kiss. And one time no excuse would cover.
Relationships: David Alleyne/Tommy Shepherd
Comments: 16
Kudos: 56





	1. The First One We All Know

**Author's Note:**

> Listen. Don't think when you're in the shower about how much you want Tommy and David to kiss. About how you want them to be a bit more canon than a few panels in a story about Teddy. And definitely don't think about how David and Tommy in a relationship has to go over with the whole Krakoa thing and Tommy being Wanda's son. Nope. Don't think about it. 
> 
> Basically this is going to be a short collection of moments (I pray) that is meant to get Tommy and David from that hill in YA to the point where they are in Lords of Empyre: Hulkling, and then one step further. Hopefully to be done very quickly just because I wanted to write something as a 'warm up' of sorts. 
> 
> This first chapter is brief because we don't need to rehash that one too deeply, right? The other one should hopefully be out today as well.

The first time everyone knew about. Okay, maybe not  _ everyone _ everyone. Perhaps that’s why it was the one that went so long unremarked upon, even when David’s thoughts turned to the moment over the years. He remembered it so well, the feeling of the grass under his hand and under his legs, remembered the pounding of music down the hill, remembered the play of lights and the absolute terror in his heart with each beat. The contact had started as a challenge raised by another, the key to a lock that if he could only turn it he could solve the mystery that had first brought him back into the costume, into the field. It had started as the feeling of chapped lips against some silk-poly blend fabric barely even stretched over skin so it bunched and caught in that first moment. But only that first moment. 

The second moment had been so very different, because everything had literally changed with it. Instead of fabric there was the warmth of another pair of lips, softer and sweeter than he’d ever have expected. Not that he had ever thought about it, not  _ really  _ at least. Why should he, right? Tommy was a friend, had been a friend for only a few days before David had thrown himself into the great unknown mess that was the adventure he’d been dragged into. But if he’d had to guess he’d say that they would be chapped from the wind, torn from the excited and nervous pull of teeth against easily broken skin, and maybe even hard from every bit of everything he knew about the elder of Magneto’s grandsons. He would have been, and was, wrong. And, a fragment of a second later, he was pushed away, the world blown away from him in so few words, hope he hadn’t known he’d been holding on to dropping out from under him like the trap door under some Specter agent in the Sean Connery days of Bond. 

Really, when all was said and done, the first kiss wasn’t really something to be commented on or analyzed. After all, the only reason David had done it was to save his friend. Plus Tommy had made it very clear quite immediately that he didn’t see anything coming from the contact. Which was fine with David, because he hadn’t wanted anything from it either. He’d just been saving a friend. That was all. 

Which didn’t at all explain why it hurt so much. 


	2. Twenty-First Birthday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The second kiss, as unintended at the last. Though this time it finds itself fueled by something a bit less end of the world than the Patrinot could ever be.

The second time happens like this. The time was nearly a year and a half later, the place a celebration that David hadn’t really thought he’d have a part of. After everything he had done with the Young Avengers he’d found that he wasn’t really _one of them_. Sure, he’d bonded with America in college. Sure, they respected him enough to reach out to him from time to time when he was needed. Yeah, there were more than a few late night conversations after Kate went to California and she just needed someone to be her ‘bi-sounding board’ while she was forced to come to terms with a few facts about herself after she watched America get another girlfriend. When it really came down to it, though, David had turned out to be _Teddy’s_ friend first and foremost, before everyone else on the scattered team. It was Teddy that he stayed up into the late night hours texting with when his friend was concerned over his relationship, and always David tried to dole out advice that would not only comfort the other man, but keep him on the road of the relationship Teddy so clearly wanted and lived for. Though he was always so very, _very_ , careful to leave out terms like ‘codependency’ and ‘commitment’ and ‘wedding’. He had long since learned the triggers. 

What it all amounted to was the fact that David remained shocked when he got the text from Billy. The twins were having a twenty-first birthday party and Billy wanted to make sure David saved the date. Given the fact that Shan’s team only rarely had use for David as their office and business manager, he had no problem committing his presence. Of course, he found himself compelled to ask. 

**David: You're sure you want me there?**

**Billy: Wow why wouldn't I**

**David: We're not exactly the closest**

**Billy: Fair but you're missing something really important here**

**David: And what exactly would that be?**

**Billy: That TOMMY really wants you there**

So there he was, in a noisy club in Manhattan, two cocktails and a lager into an impossibly noisy night. Once more the world seemed to revolve around Billy and the lights and the music and too much dancing that David had never really been down for. Not once since he’d arrived had Tommy so much as looked his way. All night he’d been moving through the crowds, plowing through drinks in a way that only those with an accelerated metabolism or a healing factor could even begin to touch, and dancing with any pretty woman that caught his eye. There were no words in David’s genius brain for the particular ache that left in his chest. 

_Tommy_ was the one that was supposed to want him to be here after all, and yet… David sighed and looked up from his bottle, toward the dance floor and the flashing lights and somewhere out there Tommy would be. Probably already lost his shirt, probably living up the night. There had been a time when they were closer, when they were friends, that Tommy had once confessed that he’d never expected to make twenty-one. 

_At first I never thought I’d make it through juvie_ , Tommy had said, halfway through a carton of lo mein, picking at it with his chopsticks. They’d known each other for all of two hours, and there had just been something about Tommy Shepherd that had gotten David to open up in a way he hadn’t done in years. Clearly there was something in him as well, because Tommy wasn’t smiling, he was just talking. _After that I_ knew _I would never survive super juvie. And once the team took me in, I didn’t think I’d hit eighteen, you know? Heroics has a fucking insane turnover rate._

 _Trust me, I know,_ David had cut in, memories flashing through his head that he shoved aside roughly because he couldn’t stand to face them. 

_But here I am, still standing. It’s a fucking miracle_. 

And when Tommy had smiled as he’d said that, there had been a flutter of something in David’s stomach that he hadn’t felt in so long. Something that was vulnerable and weak in a way that would get him hurt. Something David had immediately killed and not thought back to. 

Which was, of course, a lie, because David felt it here and now, under the flashing lights and the pounding house music, as his eyes searched the dance floor for Tommy. 

“Hey there, you’re looking a bit lonely.”

What? The voice came from somewhere that wasn’t the dance floor and David looked up, his eyes searching until he found the person standing near the table, smiling. A man, probably about David’s own age, his skin tone a rich olive that set the perfect pearly white of his teeth to levels of luminous that they really weren’t that fair. His dark eyes held David pinned to the table, clearly roving over his body, and given the way his smile didn’t waver he found something he liked there. Something to like in the tight jeans and mostly buttoned shirt with the sleeves rolled up that was really more work appropriate clothes than it was anything he should have chosen to wear to a club. Clothes that screamed ‘young professional out of his element’ just like the way the t-shirt the stranger was wearing screamed ‘looking for hook-up’ with the way the rhinestones and glitter on it picked out the words **Bachelor Party King** in rainbow tones. 

What the sentiment was meant to convey, David wasn’t entirely certain. Perhaps it meant the man was getting married in the morning. Maybe he was just the best man or another member of the party. Maybe if he stared at it long enough, hard enough, he’d find an answer somewhere in his genius intellect that was currently very strongly inhibited by so much alcohol. Or maybe if he just kept staring the man would walk away. 

“You look lonely,” the stranger said, the smile dimming just a little as he spoke. “Mind if I join you?”

“I’m here with a party.”

A stupid response, from lips that felt clumsy. Still the stranger smiled. Still his eyes appraised David, with a sort of hunger that said David was not getting out of this conversation easily. Especially with that less than optimum excuse. He could see it now, the man asking ‘well maybe we should change the party because you don't’ seem to be having fun’. Because he wasn’t, not really. Casual drinking wasn’t David’s idea of a good time. He’d seen it destroy people before, and he didn’t want to be a statistic, even if his recently reconnected biokinetic best friend would be able to reach into his body and make alcohol the last thing David ever wanted to drink. 

“Well maybe the party isn’t very good if-”

“Yo man, come and dance with me.”

The words were sudden, out of left field, and absolutely, undeniably, Tommy. They had cut through the stranger’s beginning of a flirtatious line (and David was proud that he’d been able to predict the line of it despite the alcohol in his system) the same way Tommy’s arrivals and departures cut poignant lines through the lives of the people he knew. In fact, it felt like one of the few times David had been in the field with the Young Avengers in the after Mother period. One second he’d been calling for assistance getting people out of a wrecked car that a Doombot was going for, the next second both he and the woman that had been in the car were across the street, a gust of air and a flash of green telling all the story that David needed to know. And it had been timely too, given the damn car had exploded a moment later. David remembered thinking how strange that was, given it wasn’t exactly easy for cars to blow up. 

There Tommy was, though, standing at David’s side of the table, his hand resting on David’s shoulder. It felt warm through David’s shirt, searingly hot actually, which was strange because even though Tommy always felt warmer than most people he had never felt this hot to David. Another sign that he was probably pretty close to three sheets to the wind. Hilarious, really, that David knew everything there was to getting wasted and everything there was to drinking without getting wasted, but he’d never gotten to this point before in his life. What had led to the departure from the norm? Strange how his brain couldn’t pinpoint it. Perhaps it was too focused on the hand even now on his shoulder, a thumb rubbing back and forth, back and forth, back and forth like wiper blades on a car windshield, hypnotizing in the soothing regularity that was so at odds with the speed and energy of the man at his side. 

David’s eyes cast up that arm, bare because Tommy had shown up in a tight black tank top that showed off every last muscle in his arms and made the ones in his back scream for attention and maybe for lips and tongues to explore them, and yep. There was no denying that David was well past gone if he was thinking about Tommy like that. Stupid. Very stupid. But up his eyes kept going, until he caught the flash of the club lights in the soft blue of Tommy’s eyes. No, soft normally, soft for him, but right now they looked… agitated. Because of the other man? An interesting theory. 

“Um, excuse me, I was talking to-”

Again the dark eyed stranger was cut off as Tommy reached down and grabbed David’s hand, hauling him out of his chair and to his feet. 

“Yeah, good for you,” Tommy answered, a bit more of a sharp edge coming into his voice. One that David wasn’t fully familiar with. Still, it foretold trouble, and so David turned his attention to the stranger. 

“And it seems my party beckons,” he offered as an apology, an explanation, a careful snipping of wires to defuse the time bomb that was Tommy Shepherd when he called dibs on something. Or someone. The stranger looked less than pleased, but David didn’t care. He wasn’t going to stand around while Tommy looked smug or assumed he had a right to be possessive, or just started a fight because things had been going too peacefully for a while. 

All David knew was that he had to be moving, so he was, pulling Tommy along with him as he stumbled toward the dance floor. Partway there he dropped the hand in his and wasn’t surprised when Tommy didn’t reach for it again. 

“You know, just because it’s your birthday party doesn’t mean you should ignore the guest you invited,” David mumbled under his breath as he reached the dance floor. If he could just get Tommy back into the dancing he could go off and find the guy, maybe have some actual fun tonight. 

He shouldn’t have expected Tommy not to hear it, really he shouldn’t. Sometimes he forgot about the whole package deal that came with Tommy’s powers, including enhanced senses. Which meant that even with the din of the party and the distance, Tommy heard him. The guy must have because then Tommy was right in front of him, looking at David like he’d grown a second head. 

“Dude, what was that supposed to mean? I didn’t invite you. I know because if I’d invited you, I would have, you know, invited you.”

Oh. David’s stomach dropped and his eyes cast about for Billy, because really he wanted to punch Tommy’s twin in that second more than he’d ever wanted to punch anyone for anything before. Which was stupid. There were people that deserved it far more than Billy did, even if Billy really massively deserved it. 

“You don’t like parties like this,” Tommy continued, and that left David staring at him, mouth falling open as his eyes flashed back to Tommy. Tommy who was putting his arms around David’s shoulders and starting to dance, pulling David with him into the music. 

“I’ve never said…”

“But you have begged out of just about every club thing the team has invited you to. And the ones you’ve gone to you’ve looked uncomfortable. So, yanno, figured you wouldn’t like it. Was gonna suggest we do something else, a bros hanging thing, to celebrate, but Billy really wanted this because he’s always been a momma’s boy and never drank before so bam, club for the birthday boys. Before I knew it he was telling me you were coming along too.”

This was a lot more complicated than David could manage to process. At least more complicated than he could manage to process while also dancing. Since he wasn’t in the mood to trip all over himself and knock them both over, putting them in the way of a possible trampling, David didn’t respond. Not at first. How did you respond to that? 

It was easier to dance than to think, than to feel, than to admit to the relief. And a lot easier than realizing Tommy really watched him enough at things like this to notice, to care about what would make David comfortable. 

“And I figured you wouldn’t want some strange guy bothering you,” Tommy continued when the silence between them seemed to stretch too long. Tommy Shepherd had never really struck David as a fan of long silences. Still, this was short, even for him. 

“He wasn’t bothering me. He was flirting,” David corrected. “Or about to.”

As expected, the distracting himself to respond led to a fumbling, led to his foot almost coming down on Tommy’s as they moved. And of course, Tommy being a speedster meant that the foot was gone somewhere between the moment when David realized he was about to do so and the actual doing so. That in turn led to a fumbling sort of step that almost had him falling, only Tommy’s arm was around his waist, pulling him close, holding him safely up and away from the menace of the feet around them. 

Everything happened so quickly that it took David’s breath away. They were close, so close, bodies pressed together in a way that they never had been before. It was that, David reasoned, that led to the next part. Or maybe it was the alcohol still burning in his blood. But there had to be a reason for the way he leaned his head down, just the littlest bit. Had to be a reason for how their lips pressed together. Had to be a reason for the warmth of Tommy’s skin against his own. 

Alcohol. Chalk it all up to alcohol. 

“And it’s official, you’ve had too much to drink,” Tommy laughed when David pulled away. Was it a laugh, was it real amusement or was it just nerves? David didn’t know, but his heart definitely skipped a beat. 

Strange how this time Tommy didn’t push him away and remind him of the line in the sand between them. Strange how Tommy just smiled and shook his head. Strange how so much had happened in so little time.

“Yeah, maybe,” David agreed as he pulled back just a little bit. “I should call it a night.”

“Cool,” Tommy agreed, his arms slipping from around David. “Give me a minute, okay? I’ll tell the others I’m slipping out and then I’ll make sure you get home safely.”

“You playing designated escort tonight?”

“Dude, me and Teddy both. We’re the only ones here who can actually tolerate drinking for real. Now go get your coat. Don’t worry, I can come back when I’ve got you safely tucked away.”

David wouldn’t know for a week that Tommy never went back to the party after leaving David safely at his apartment door.


	3. Mario Kart Is For Losing Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A third kiss, the product of the foolishness of spending time with friends who just won’t let you have a controller. Sometimes you have to make your own fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, sorry about the delay on this. Life... Well, it just comes at you sometimes.

There was less time between the second and the third than there had been between the first and the second. This time it was only the matter of a month and a half before the invitation had come, this time for a night of ‘gaming and chaos’ as Noh-Varr had put the invitation. Where Billy and Tommy’s birthday had been advertised on the label as an evening to celebrate as friends and a team and turned into chaos, this had been billed as chaos and turned out to be a bit more tame than David had expected. 

The gaming chosen had been more of the party game variety, shared in shifts on Noh-Varr’s ship screen, and so in massive size. David had been forced to come by a few hours early to help Noh-Varr connect the console up to the systems on Noh-Varr’s ship, which he’d found vaguely suspicious because he knew that the Kree was more than smart enough to be able to handle the issue himself. Perhaps the reason had been because Noh-Varr had been conspiring with someone to get him there, because David hadn’t been told that the Minimoffs (as Tommy had taken to calling himself and his brother) were attending. Not that Billy’s presence, or Tommy’s, would have stopped him from showing up. Or so David liked to believe. There was no reason he had been avoiding the twins in particular for the last month and a half. It wasn’t like he spent hours trying to figure out just what had compelled him to kiss Tommy yet again even though he knew he shouldn’t. 

Of course the answer had been obvious, but still David hadn’t wanted to touch it.

Either way, here he was now, watching the current round of Mario Kart going on up on the screen. While everyone else was having fun with that, David sat back and watched the others play, drink in hand. 

“I’m not sure how much I appreciate being banished from the games I helped set up,” David grumbled as he poured himself his second glass of wine for the night. Why Noh-Varr had decided the best sort of drinks to have for the night were high end wines was beyond David, but he was still having some. 

“Let’s face it, they’re just threatened by our skills,” Tommy, who had also been turned away from Mario Kart, sighed. 

They sat together at a table behind the couch and pillows where everyone was flopped over, a table for those cast out for their skill at gaming. David was just talented, given too much time to practice and understanding how to game the system. Tommy? Banished over the fact that his reaction time was too perfect and so once he saw David do things once or twice, he could perfectly replicate them given he had all the time in the world. Everyone else was about equally matched, so the two had been sent away to watch so everyone else could have a chance to win for a change. 

“Yeah, but coming all the way up to orbit to sit and watch other people have fun isn’t really doing it for me.”

There was an amused noise at his side and David let his eyes turn to Tommy. He’d been working so hard all night to not pay too much attention to the other man. Just looking at Tommy sent his heart fluttering like a schoolboy with a crush. 

Of course it was with that very thought that he realized what was going on, realized why he was so awkward about this now. That was exactly what he was, if you aged it up a few years. He did have a crush, he did have feelings for Tommy Shepherd. Which was stupid, because Tommy didn’t want to have a relationship with him. Tommy was straight as a non-boomerang arrow. And David, oh David. 

_ Got your damn heart set on the wrong person once again, didn’t you? _ David mused in his own head before taking another sip of wine.  _ You’d think the whole time for boyhood crushes was over _ . 

Then again, he had to remind himself that his heart was only five years old, and while he knew emotions were in the brain, the metaphor was still fitting. New heart, new loves. But why, he wondered, did he have to have a propensity for those he could never have? 

“This is fucking boring,” Tommy agreed, throwing back the rest of his own cup of wine before calling out to the others. “This is  _ fucking boring _ I said. You nerds should let me play again.”

“Find your own game, Tommy,” Billy snapped back. “I’ve almost edged Kate out for the lead!”

“Like hell you have, Kaplan,” Kate laughed, just as David turned his eyes back to the screen and he was greeted to the sight of Kate dropping a banana peel right in the path of Billy’s cart. 

At least there was immediate karmic retribution for Billy’s smart mouth. To have it delivered by Kate was probably better than giving Tommy a reason to go and sass his brother all on his own. It meant that David didn’t have to reach out, laying his hand on Tommy’s arm, to keep him there. Yet his mind, now that he had the very thought there, couldn’t let go of it. Tommy’s skin, every time that David had touched him before, had been warm to the touch, a bit rough too. Wind chapped, David thought. He should use a more moisturizing body wash to help deal with that, which of course led to David’s thoughts going to Tommy cleaning himself up and… 

“I think wine and I don’t mix,” David mumbled to his glass. 

The words were barely out before the glass was liberated from his hand and Tommy was drinking from it. A traitorous little part of his brain marked down an added indirect kiss to their tally, even if Tommy wasn’t even drinking from the same side of the glass. Dammit, what was wrong with him today?

“If they’re not gonna let us play with them, maybe you should play with me,” Tommy suggested, his voice low, his eyes bright with mischief. 

There were probably so many doors in the world that Tommy could get through with that voice, vibrating through them notwithstanding. 

“What sort of game?” David asked, pitching his voice vaguely toward distrustful. The sorts of messes that the other guy could get up to were rather impressive. 

“Ever do Truth or Dare in that stuffy school of yours?”

“Oh, it wasn’t stuffy. We often were down a wall or two so it could be very breezy.”

The words were silly, but David needed to say something. When Tommy was left hanging the guy tended to make more and more outrageous statements. 

“But no, never. There were a lot of other things going on, and I expect Emma Frost would have caught us if we ever tried. Can you imagine the sorts of detentions you can experience with a telepath?”

“Rather not. That bitch got into our heads once. Billy and mine. When we found Wanda. Neither of us were fans of what the X-Men were up to that day, and Emma tried to deal with that by manipulating us.”

Yeah, that sounded about par for the course for her. 

“She can be like that,” David agreed with a sigh. “You really want to play something like that? It’s not supposed to be good with only two people.”

“Sure it is, if we go dare only,” Tommy countered as he finished David’s wine. “Because then we can get them involved with it whether they want it or not.”

That sounded a bit… questionable. But who was David to say no? Something told him if he didn’t do it, things would get even weirder than they already were. 

“Fine, who goes first?”

Tommy grinned, all chaos and promises of fun to be had. 

“You get the first dare. Kiss someone in this room, but do it without making them crash.”

David’s eyes turned toward the group on and around the couch, the intensity of the game play. There was a chance that if he did anything, he’d get one of them to crash. This needed some tactical work. 

“And if they do?” 

“Guess you get punished,” Tommy’s grin only grew. It was enough to make David decide he really didn’t want to know. So he went with the only answer that seemed logical. 

There was no way he moved fast enough to keep Tommy from avoiding him. That said, he clearly was catching the guy off guard, why else would Tommy stay still as David leaned forward and pressed their lips together.

This time it was fast. A quick, stolen little peck, just enough for David to feel the roughness of Tommy’s lips and their heat. Even though it was quick he still found his heart racing, pounding so hard that he could feel it in his mouth, hear it in his ears. 

When he pulled back Tommy stared at him for a moment, just a brief, frightening moment. And then Tommy burst out laughing. 

“Fucking hell. That was so completely in the rules. Guess I’ll have to come up with something better next time. My turn?”

“Yeah, just… give me a moment to come up with something.”

And to stop his heart racing. Luckily David didn’t expect that would happen again. 


End file.
